Broken Thorn
by Pandora North Star
Summary: A song fic (I know) from the end of Beneath You.


Title: Broken Thorn  
Author: PNS*  
Rating: PG  
Summary: Takes place at the end of Beneath You. Song by Rufus Wainwright.  
  
  
  
\\I've heard there was  
A secret chord  
That David played, and  
It pleased the Lord  
But you don't really care  
For music, do you?  
It goes like this:  
The fourth, the fifth  
The minor fall, the major lift  
The baffled king  
Composing Hallelujah//  
  
Buffy watched him, cold and stuttering, his whole body on the verge of collapsing. She wanted to reach out but she was too stunned to think let alone move. Every broken bit of him shined through his teary eyes. He refused her hands which reached out to her and stepped closer to the large metallic cross, an iron reminder that fate is elusive but iron at the same time. She watched in horror as he slid across it, his arms hugging it.   
  
Hallelujah, Hallelujah  
Hallelujah, Hallelujah   
  
Hard to picture Spike as Christ, but at that moment he was the Lord's son, tortured and dying, bleeding for salvation. The dim light highlighted his newly bleached hair until the point it glowed with its own halo of light. He uttered only a few short words after his speech, ones that sunk to the bottom of Buffy's very soul.  
  
Your faith was strong  
But you needed proof  
You saw her bathing  
On the roof  
Her beauty and the  
Moonlight overthrew you  
She tied you to a kitchen chair  
She broke your throne  
And she cut your hair  
And from your lips  
She drew the Hallelujah   
  
"Can we rest now Buffy?" His voice cracked in agony. How long had he been harboring this torture in the basement, alone except for the voices? "Can we rest now?" Smoke sizzled off his body as it burned.   
  
Hallelujah, Hallelujah  
Hallelujah, Hallelujah   
  
she wanted to cry out, her thoughts so jumbled she knew they would never untwist. Was this the same man who had tried to rape her? No? But he wore the same skin. Skin he had offered to her only moments before, mirroring her own unworthiness. For along time she had thought she didn't have a soul. But then she knew she did when it broke. It broke For Xander and Anya, Willow and Tara and herself.   
  
Maybe I've been here before  
I know this room  
I've walked this floor  
I used to live alone  
Before I knew you  
I've seen your flag  
On the marble arch  
Love is not a victory march  
It's a cold and  
It's a broken Hallelujah   
  
The moments slipped by like hours, her standing there silently stunned, while he sobbed. Was this how Angel had reacted the first time he had a soul? She didn't think so. He hadn't sought it out in the name of love. He had been punished with it. Love. It was love that she wasn't worthy of now.  
  
Hallelujah, Hallelujah  
Hallelujah, Hallelujah   
  
Then he fell, stumbling backwards onto his knees, gasping and crying, his skin still sizzling. Bubbling red skin across his chest and arms. Buffy finally let slip an echoing sob and reached forward. Would he let her hold him now?  
  
There was a time  
You let me know  
What's really going on below  
But now you never show  
It to me, do you?  
I remember when  
I moved in, you  
Your holy dark  
Was moving too  
And every breath we drew  
Was Hallelujah   
  
"Buffy?" He was barely concious as she slipped his head into her arms and craddled him.   
"Rest now." Buffy managed to choke out the words as she rocked him back and forth. "Rest now William."  
  
Hallelujah, Hallelujah  
Hallelujah, Hallelujah   
  
Her world had never been simple. Spike's feelings she had taken for granted, constantly testing them, never believing. And suddenly it was so different, so shaken, so fragile. He was different than Angel. It was more than love that brought him to the Church. It was deeper than the need for atonement.  
  
Maybe there's a God above  
And all I ever  
Learned from love  
Was how to shoot  
At someone  
Who outdrew you  
It's not a cry  
You can hear at night  
It's not somebody  
Who's seen the light  
It's a cold and  
It's a broken Hallelujah   
  
What had brought them to that spot was a mystery for powers above that had yet to reveal it to them. But as she held him, for a brief shining moment, Buffy felt her world grow a little brighter, the path become a little more clear.  
  
Hallelujah, Hallelujah  
Hallelujah, Hallelujah   
  
Hallelujah, Hallelujah  
Hallelujah, Hallelujah 


End file.
